


The First Born

by Persephone_Kore



Category: Girl Genius
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2015-04-01
Packaged: 2018-03-20 16:20:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3656976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persephone_Kore/pseuds/Persephone_Kore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: </p><p> <i>AU: Klaus Barry Survives</i></p><p>
  <i>Maybe the castle managed to shield him from the explosion. Maybe Otilla/Von Pinn saved him. Maybe Lucrezia had second thoughts about killing her son and took precautions (unlikely, but technically possible). Point is, Lucrezia's gone, the castle's broken - but Bill's son is still alive.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Do Bill and Barry still leave to find the Other? Does Barry return to Mechanicsburg with Agatha? Does Klaus still hire the Jaegers when they have a Heterodyne, albeit a tiny one? Does Gil have another friend at the school?</i>
</p><p>The Heterodyne Boys still go to look for Bill's lost wife, and still disappear. But when Klaus comes to Mechanicsburg, it still has a Heterodyne.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The First Born

* * *

They fought the winds across the last pass, and the walls of Mechanicsburg came into view. Klaus drew a breath that was somewhere between relief and apprehension. The Castle was... part of it seemed to have started to fall over, but it was so overbuilt it hadn't gone far. The outer walls were more intact than some of the rumors made out, but then nobody from Bill and Barry on down would have left the place completely defenseless. Nothing like what he'd found in his own town. But it was eerily quiet, and even though there was no siege going on, the gates were shut.

He wasn't surprised that he hadn't heard from them. Well -- he'd have expected to hear from a few friends. Nobody _mentioned_ Punch and Judy going out with Bill and Barry to search for the Other. But he assumed they had, if they'd survived the initial attack. If they'd been left behind they would probably have gotten in touch when his own return became obvious. 

But despite the latest Heterodynes' heroic tendencies and the resulting tourists, the bulk of Mechanicsburg was still insular. They'd trade. They'd welcome people to spend money. They wouldn't raid or conquer, when they'd been told not to -- it had been a relief to extend close enough that there was finally _one_ side he wasn't being attacked on -- but they wouldn't go out and look for ways to help, either. 

He only hoped they'd answer when a friend of their masters asked. They _would_ be better off the more he could stabilize the area. Better off for travel and trade. Better for the Jägers having something to do besides wait, and watch, and remind everyone of the days when Mechanicsburg was an enemy. Protecting everyone was going to be almost as difficult as when he'd first started, if he kept collecting undefended regions that didn't actually know how to fight. 

Mechanicsburg knew how to fight. 

Klaus fought the temptation to glance over his shoulder. Bringing Gil with his diplomatic party, even with a nurse and kept out of sight, was a risk. But leaving an _eight-year-old_ in the fever of breakthrough and his new _lobster construct_ somewhere with no Sparks in reach was simply not to be thought of. 

They had to answer. He needed help. They might not like the idea of joining someone else's empire (the last person to suggest it had been the Storm King), but he didn't think they'd insist on a war. They _were_ old friends, and that would be bad for all parties. 

He considered and discarded trying to land inside the town, then set down at a distance and walked up to the closed gates. 

One of the gargoyles looked down at him, and the back of his neck prickled. The Castle wasn't wholly inactive, then. The gate swung open, without the usual theatrical boom, to reveal General Goomblast (encouraging: Klaus liked the other Jägergenerals, but Goomblast tended to handle diplomacy), Carson, his daughter-in-law Arella... that told a story in itself. The last time he'd been in Mechanicsburg he'd danced at her wedding. 

He could _not_ bring himself to say anything along the lines of "Good afternoon." Instead he tried starting, "It's good to see you again." 

He was interrupted by a child's voice howling "Out of my way!" and everybody turned. A small boy pelted up through the gate, deftly dodging everyone standing there -- Klaus was honestly impressed -- and drew up short to stare at the strangers. 

A ferocious-looking clawed blonde woman stalked after him, got as far as saying severely, "It is _time_ for your nap, young master--" and then broke off. 

Probably because even if he was a child, younger than Gil, you didn't undermine the Heterodyne heir in front of someone at the gates of the town. And this had to be. Of course everybody was wearing trilobites, but he looked like Bill. Almost, except for the bright green eyes. And he looked _at_ Klaus in _exactly_ the way Bill had looked at strangers when he wasn't worn out by insistent enemies or, earlier on, by people being automatically terrified of Heterodynes. 

It occurred to Klaus in a distant way that going on one knee to the Heterodyne was not exactly the political stance he'd planned. 

The boy smiled at him and said, "I'm Klaus Barry Heterodyne," and Klaus forgot to breathe. 

Lucrezia had sent him away, and Bill had -- Bill had -- vanished, but he'd named his son in Klaus's memory, most likely, because presumably Lucrezia had declared him dead, and-- "Who are you?" the boy prompted him. 

Klaus swallowed and said, "Klaus Wulfenbach. I was--"

Klaus Barry lit up and hurtled into his arms. 

"--I take it you've heard of me."

"Of course I have! You're Father's friend and he named me after you." Klaus Barry loosened his grip just enough to hang back from around Klaus's neck. "Are you looking for him?"

"No." _I'm so sorry._ He bit that back. "I'd like to, but I don't have the first idea where to start. And I've been trying to stop people from attacking my home."

"Do you need help?" was the serious response, and Klaus stopped and leaned his head against the boy's. That was part of what he was here for, and he'd have expected the instant offer from Bill but he hadn't expected a child who could barely have _known_ Bill to make it. 

"I could use some," he said. 

"You'd better come in," Carson said wryly, "and work out the details with somebody who isn't six."

"Yes, that sounds like a good idea." If that was a warning against abusing their child Heterodyne's generosity, Carson didn't know Klaus as well as he'd thought. Klaus needed everything Mechanicsburg could give him -- he had borders to defend, lives to save, he wouldn't apologize for that -- but he'd much rather ask it of someone who knew where it had to stop. Not that he was complaining about how the stage had been set. He stood up, still holding Bill's son, and his eyes lit on the nurse. She looked like she might be related to Lucrezia, but probably wasn't, and very slightly Jägerish, which was also unlikely. She also looked deeply disapproving. He offered Klaus Barry back to her and said, "I have a son--"

\--He felt as if the words dropped like stones and silence fell around them, as if his enemies ought to be popping out and charging the airship before it could take off, but in fact the road entering Mechanicsburg was on ground cleared for a long way around and easily defended, and everyone was merely waiting politely for him to finish his sentence-- 

"I want to meet him!" Klaus Barry announced. All right, _almost_ everyone. 

"I thought it was time for your nap," Klaus said, which caused the boy to look outraged and the nurse to _almost_ crack a smile. Possibly. "I _would_ like you to meet him. Actually, I was hoping I could bring him in. I have been provoking a lot of people lately --" That drew smiles all around, slightly edged ones but not turned against him. " _And_ he's in breakthrough."

"Vait a second," Goomblast objected. " _Vhen_ did hyu get a son?" 

"He's eight," Klaus said. Which would tell them what he'd been doing since he vanished, anyway.

"And in _breakthrough_?" Arella's eyebrows rose. 

"This is the first we've heard of a son," Carson said inquisitively. 

" _Good._ I haven't been making it public, but he's getting difficult to hide." Klaus smiled ruefully at the nurse. "And there's nowhere safer on the ground than Mechanicsburg."

She looked at him, then back past him. "Are you suggesting you expect to be able to make an airship safer than Mechanicsburg?"

Klaus was startled into laughter. "I'm working on it!"

"I want to _meet_ him," Klaus Barry insisted. 

Klaus opened his mouth, then met the nurse's eyes. "Fraulein...?"

"Madame Von Pinn." She gave him a wry look and then conceded. "Very well."

Klaus tried not to grin. "All right. Let's go." 

There was a kite flying out a window of the airship, straining in the mountain wind, which Klaus regarded somewhat ruefully. A little conspicuous. Probably not a giveaway of anything except that there was _a_ child on board, though. He led the way in to the lab where he'd left Gil -- made as child-safe as he could manage without taking away everything Gil could possibly work with, and left under the supervision of someone comfortable watching Spark work. (Rarer on the ground lately, even in what was left of Wulfenbach, after the attacks they'd had to survive with him gone.) 

Maybe a little _too_ comfortable. The nurse met him at the door to say, "He's finally getting some sleep--" and paused to look startled at the group following him, and over her words Klaus could hear a growing whine that screamed _overloading engine, about to explode_. He lifted her bodily out of the doorway and dashed in. Gil was slumped over on the workbench next to his latest project, which was the source of the whine. Klaus snatched him away, knocked the engine down to the other side of the bench, and whirled back to the door. 

The engine went silent behind him, and he looked over his shoulder. 

Von Pinn was standing with her arms folded on the opposite side of the workbench. Klaus Barry was standing _on_ it with a knife in one hand and the severed kite string in the other, grinning. 

Gil, naturally awakened by all this commotion, glanced up at Klaus and then looked around, shook his head blearily and asked, "Who're you?" 

Klaus Barry jumped down from the workbench. "I'm Klaus Barry Heterodyne," he said. "We're going to be friends! But you really shouldn't set up traps and then fall asleep in them." 

"I didn't mean to," Gil said, bemused. He looked up at Klaus again. "We are?"

"I hope so," Klaus said. "I told him about you. Mechanicsburg is--" _Safe_ was not the word. "Friendly." Then to Bill's son, "This is Gil." 

Permission thus granted, Gil lit up and darted over to rescue his (now rather battered) wind-driven motor, then settled down with Klaus Barry to take it apart again. 

Von Pinn looked over their heads at Klaus, who prepared himself to be taken to task for interfering with the young Heterodyne's nap. "I might like you," she said instead, sounding as if this was a rare and unexpected occurrence. "And I think you _do_ need help."

* * *


End file.
